Translating Songs in Shakespearean Drama: Adaptation

or Appropriation?
Shaymaa Adham Basheer
Assistant Professor of English Department, faculty of Arts,South Valley University, Qena, Egypt

ABSTRACT
Modern Translation Studies, supported by the so-called
French Theory, suggest that translation can be a form of
ARTICLE INFO
Received adaptation. Insofar as it relies on transcoding, translation
Accepted
adapts a literary text from one cultural matrix into another.
Whether in prose or poetry, the verbal transcoding will in
the end rely on the culture behind the text. However, when
a poet translates another poet, the translator’s own lexicon,
based on his or her culture, may transform the adaptation
into appropriation. Nothing exemplifies this more
conspicuously than the translation of Shakespearean songs
Keywords
in his oft-translated dramatic works. There are two ways of
Adaptation, rendering these songs into Arabic: either to follow the old,
Appropriation, established practice of regarding them as an essential
Shakespearean component of the dramatic situation, or to regard them as
capable of standing by themselves and, albeit linked to the
Drama,Songs,.
context of the drama, they can be read as independent
Translation
lyrics in their own right. The examination of their
translated versions into prose is now considered close
enough to paraphrase, which is also considered a form of
 Dr_ Shaymaa Adham Basheer (BIJHS) Vol.3 Issue 1 (2021)

adaptation. However, it is in poetry that one can perceive

the change of adaptation into appropriation. Translations
by Mutran, Al-Wakeel, Enani and Badawi show that there
has been a consistent tendency of adapting the songs to the
cultural milieu of the translator, with more appropriation
noted in the work of the early 20th century poet, Khalil
Mutran, than in more recent translations. Recent
translators increasingly think of the songs as part and
parcel of the Shakespearean text.

Introduction

Critics have written more than enough about the function of songs
in Shakespearean drama. They tend to represent two viewpoints, not
necessarily as irreconcilable as they seem to be. The first is to regard
songs as part and parcel of the play’s action, or plot, the second as
entertainment, being ironic or otherwise funny, designed to relieve the
tension when a situation becomes too stressful for the audience to
easily tolerate. The former view is therefore text-oriented, the second
audience-oriented. Represented by the classically-trained scholars of
the 20th century, Charles T. Pooler (1916), John Dover Wilson (1926)
and John Russell Brown, (1964), the former insists that the songs,
either by professional singers or by the Fool or Clown, comment on the
scene in which they occur or look forward to a future event. This view
survives in the work of Drakakis, editor of the Arden Merchant of

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 BSU International Journal of Humanities and social science

Venice (2010-2018). The other view is more modern, as shown in the

writings of Richard Halpern (1991) and Frank Kermode (2000).

As these songs are all in verse, their Arabic translations, if in verse,

should tend to support one of these views, though occasionally
combining them. However, if translated into prose they will appear
more like a “paraphrase” than an “imitation”, in terms of Dryden’s
translation theory (Preface to Ovid’s translation, 1608). As paraphrase,
the Arabic text would support the earlier view; but if in verse, they
could support either or both views.

Naturally, experienced Arabic translators opt, though implicitly,

for the second, but still allowing for the more recent view to be
perceived. However, if the translator’s departure from the so-called
source text is conspicuous, the modern view may regard it as
adaptation. Linda Hutcheon defines adaptation as closest to Dryden’s
imitation, with the possibility that the adaptation may be shown to have
appropriated Shakespeare’s text (A Theory of Adaptation, 2006). In the
Preface to the second edition of that book (2013), she tells us that in the
interim “new collections of essays have broadened the range of both
the theory and practice of adaptation studies to include indigenization
across cultures as well as translations across languages (in Laurence
Raw, ed. Translation, Adaptation and Transformation [2011]”. She
cites other works such as Rachel Carroll, ed. Adaptation in
Contemporary Culture: Textual Infidelities, 2009, and Tricia Hopton,

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 Dr_ Shaymaa Adham Basheer (BIJHS) Vol.3 Issue 1 (2021)

Adam Atkinson, Jane Stadler, and Peter Mitchell ed. Pockets of

Change: Adaptation and Cultural Transition, 2011, (cf. pp. 88 ff.)

A New Outlook

In her Preface to the first edition of the book, Hutcheon builds up

a cogent argument for adaptation, criticizing the “constant critical
denigration of the general phenomenon of adaptation” in all its forms.
(p. xiii-xiv). She tells us that from her experience she has learnt a great
deal: “One lesson is that to be second is not to be secondary, or
inferior; likewise, to be first is not to be originary or authoritative” (p.
xv). Applied to translations into Arabic, her view will be instructive,
namely the general tendency to “privilege or at least give priority (and
therefore, implicitly, value) to what is always called the “source” text
or the “original” (p. xx). Traditionally in Arabic studies of translation, a
scholar is driven to look for the source text, intent on a comparison that
should reveal the degree of faithfulness, or accuracy in transmission.
Ibrahim Abdul-Qadir al-Mazini is notorious for departing too
drastically from his “sources” so as to produce fine Arabic poems.
Abbas Mahmoud al-Aqqad swam against the current of the general
disparaging opinion by calling al-Mazini’s method the “genius of
translation.” In the poetical works of Ahmad Shawqi, one finds poems
called “from the French”, and in the Apollo magazine (1932-4) one
encounters many translations, sometimes of the same poem, but which
are in fact adaptations.

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In application of Hutcheon’s view about the affinity of translation

and adaptation, it may be better to see how the two songs sung by the
Fool (‫ )البهلول‬in King Lear are rendered by the same translator (Enani),
and occurring in two separate scenes. The first is an 8-line brevity in
which the Fool (clown) vows loyalty to his master the king, but the
song is addressed to Kent. It obviously contributes to the action, or the
plot, as the earlier view of the function of songs claims:

That, sir, that serves and seeks for gain

And follows best for form,
Will pack when it begins to rain,
And leave thee in the storm.
But I will tarry; the fool will stay,
And let the wise man fly;
The knave turns fool that runs away,
The fool no knave, perdy.
II.iii.72-9

‫ب األ َ ْو َف ْر‬ َ ‫َم ْن يَ ْخدُ ْم‬

ِ ‫س ْعيًا لل َك ْس‬
‫ظ َه ْر‬ ْ ‫ويَس ِْر بِ ِر َكابِكَ ِم ْن أجْ ل ال َم‬
‫ت‬ ْ َ‫يهجرك إذا ب َدأ‬ َ ‫بث أن‬ َ ‫لَ ْن ي ْل‬
‫ت ُ ْم ِط ْر‬
‫عاصفَ ٍة‬ َ ‫ص ُمدَ َوحْ دَكَ في‬ ْ َ‫ك ْي ت‬
‫تَ ْهد ِْر‬
‫لن‬ ْ َ‫لن أَ ْسلُ َوكَ وبُ ْهلُولُك‬ ْ ‫لكني‬
ْ‫يَ ْذهَب‬
‫أن‬ْ ‫حتّى ْلو كانَ على ال َعاقِ ِل َحقًّا‬
ْ‫يَ ْه ُرب‬
‫إن َولَّى‬ ْ َ‫س َي ْغدو أَ ْبلَه‬ َ ُ‫فالو ْغد‬ َ
ْ َ‫األ َ ْدب‬
‫ار‬
ْ ‫أ َّما البُ ْهلُو ُل‬
‫فلن يَ ْغد َُو َو ْغدًا َم ْه َما‬

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‫ار‬
ْ ‫ص‬َ

As this is followed by the trials and tribulations of the king,

having been betrayed by his two daughters and left alone in the
wilderness (on the heath) amidst a raging storm, Kent advises him to
seek shelter in a lowly hut, and the Fool now upbraids the King,
insisting that he is harebrained. He now sings to King Lear, another
functional song (dramatically) before concluding the scene with a 14-
line comment on the expected deterioration of life.

Fool: (singing)
He that has and a little tiny wit,--
With a heigh, ho, the wind and the rain,--
Must make content with his fortunes fit
For the rain it raineth every day.
(III.ii. 69-72)
With alternating lines of five and four feet, and a single rhyme in
lines 69 and 71, the song is sarcastic and has an apothegmatic quality,
both reflected in Enani’s version:

‫عق ِل ِه ِمثْقَا َ َل‬

َ ‫َم ْن َكانَ قَد ُْر‬
‫خ َْر َدلَ ْة‬
‫ار‬ ُ ‫ط‬ َ ‫الريَا ُح واأل َ ْم‬ ّ ِ ‫و َه ِذ ِه‬
‫َاطلَ ْة‬
ِ ‫ه‬
‫ضى و َي ْس َع َد‬ َ ‫أن َير‬ ْ َّ‫ال بُد‬
‫بالغُيُو ْم‬
‫ارنَا فِي ُك ِّل‬ ُ ‫ط‬ َ
َ ‫فَ ِع ْندَنَا أ ْم‬
‫َي ْو ْم‬

The reference is of course to the character of King Lear, ironically

inviting him to be gratified with the storm. When Lear asks Kent to
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take him to the hovel, and both leave the stage, the Fool addresses the
audience, delivering what he describes as a prophecy: it is a
contemplation of a world deteriorating into an unnatural state of affairs.
The “world” he now considers is Albion, that is, England, or “this
country”. The lines are:

When priests are more in word than matter,

When brewers mar their malt with water,
When nobles are their tailors' tutors,
No heretics burned but wenches' suitors,
When every case in law is right,
No squire in debt nor no poor knight,
When slanders do not live in tongues,
Nor cutpurses come not to throngs,
When usurers tell their gold i' th' field,
And bawds and whores do churches build—
Then shall the realm of Albion
Come to great confusion.
Then comes the time, who lives to see ’t,
That going shall be used with feet.
(III.ii.81-94)

Unable to relate the 14-line prophecy to any part of the action in

King Lear, some scholars and critics have suspected that its writer may
not be Shakespeare, or that the actor playing the part of the Fool may
have been the author. Recent research shows it is more likely that
Shakespeare himself may have added the lines, either at the request of
the ‘Player’ or as a relief from the tension now building up to a climax,
as the next scene sees Edmund’s plotting against his father, the King,
followed by the King himself battling the elements. The 14-line ‘piece’
has rhyming couplets, in tetrameter, and offers a bleak picture of the
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 ‫)‪Dr_ Shaymaa Adham Basheer (BIJHS) Vol.3 Issue 1 (2021‬‬

‫‪future, thematically but not dramatically connected with the action.‬‬

‫‪This is how Enani renders it:‬‬

‫إ َذا َما َل ُك َّهانُنَا ذاتَ يَ ْو ٍم‬

‫إلى اللَّ ْف ِظ دُونَ َمعَانِي‬
‫الك َََل ْم‬
‫ارنَا‬ ‫َخ َّم ُ‬ ‫اء‬
‫سدَ بال َم ِ‬ ‫وأَ ْف َ‬
‫ط ْع َم‬ ‫وس و َ‬ ‫َمذَاقَ ال ُكؤ ِ‬
‫ال ُمدَا ْم‬
‫الز ْه ِو أَ ْش َرافُنَا‬ ‫َت ِمنَ َّ‬ ‫وبات ْ‬
‫َحا ِئ َكنَا ال ِه ْن َدا ْم‬ ‫ت ُ َع ِلّ ُم‬
‫ارقُونَ هُنا‬ ‫ق ال َم ِ‬ ‫ولَ ْم يُحْ َر ِ‬
‫بَ ِل العَا ِشقُونَ بِ ُج ْرم الغ ََرا ْم‬
‫و ِإذ َي ْستَ ِوي ِع ْندَ قَانُونِنا‬
‫ظ ْل ُم األنَا ْم‬ ‫ع ْد ٍل و ُ‬ ‫إقَا َمةُ َ‬
‫َول ْم يَ ْشكُ أَ ْش َرافُنَا ِم ْن‬
‫ُون‬
‫دُي ٍ‬
‫ان‬ ‫س ْ‬ ‫َول ْم يَشُكُ ِم ْن فَاقَ ٍة فُ ْر َ‬
‫شتَّا ُمنَا‬ ‫ع ِن السَّبّ ِ َ‬ ‫َف َ‬ ‫وك َّ‬
‫ان‬ ‫س ْ‬ ‫ت ن َِمي َم ْة ُك ِّل ِل َ‬ ‫و َكفَّ ْ‬
‫ب زَ ني ٍم‬ ‫شا ُل َجيُ ٍ‬ ‫ت نَ َّ‬ ‫ولَ ْم يَأ ْ ِ‬
‫شو ِد‬ ‫ُح ُ‬ ‫َو ْس َ‬
‫ط‬ ‫س‬ ‫ِل َي ْندَ َّ‬
‫الز َحا ْم‬ ‫َّ‬
‫ب ُهنَا‬ ‫وأَ ْقدَ َم ُك ُّل ُم َرا ٍ‬
‫ع ْن ِرب ِْح ِه في‬ ‫فأ ْعلَنَ َ‬
‫ال َح َرا ْم‬
‫ص َب َح أَ ْه ُل القُ َوا َد ِة‬ ‫وأَ ْ‬
‫ساتُ‬ ‫وال ُم ِو ِم َ‬
‫دين الس َََّل ْم‬ ‫ِ‬ ‫بُنَاة َكنَائِ ِس‬
‫َل ِد‬‫ف َي ُح ُّل ِبهذِي ال ِب ِ‬ ‫س ْو َ‬ ‫فَ َ‬
‫ضى ِبغَيُر ِز َما ْم‬ ‫ار وفَ ْو َ‬ ‫دَ َم ٌ‬
‫ب َهذَا‬ ‫صحْ ُ‬ ‫فإن َ َجا َء يا َ‬ ‫ْ‬
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ُ‫الز َمان‬َّ
‫ان‬ْ َ‫وأَنَّى نً ًراهُ ك ََرأْي ِ ال ِعي‬
َ‫الو َرى فَ ْوق‬ َ ‫سيم ِشي‬ َ
‫أَ ْقدَ ِام ِه ْم‬
‫ْوم َهذَا‬ َ ‫ب الي‬ َ ‫فما أ ْغ َر‬
ْ ‫الز َم‬
‫ان‬ َّ

As all passages cited are translated by the same person, namely

M. Enani, differences in style must be attributed to his conception of
the function of each in the play. The first two are close enough to the
source text. Their reference is to anyone: “He who is”, or “he who
seeks”, but obviously their deixis is to the King himself and his Fool.
The possessive (K) (‫ )ك‬in Arabic (‫)بركابك‬, (‫)وحدك‬, (‫ )يهجرك‬precedes the
deictic shift to the first person pronoun, “But I” (‫)لكني‬, again before the
final mixing of the first, second and third person pronouns in the last
three lines in the first cited passage (II.iii.72-9).

The same may be said of the song secondly cited (III.ii.69-72).

“He that has and a little tiny wit” obviously references the King
himself, and that it is ‘he’ (Shakespeare’s ‘that’) that should be
“content” with his “fit fortune” in being drenched by the rain; only the
conclusion suggests that the fool is referring to the present situation
with a place and personal deixis, namely (‫ )عندنا‬and (‫ )أمطارنا‬with the
possessive plural pronoun added by the translator as though by way of
explicitation. It is the use of this pronoun in the third song that in
Arabic establishes the reference to all people. A sentence like “It is not

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considered in good taste to look a gift horse in the mouth” may be

translated as:

‫]نرى أن[ الذوق السليم يقتضي أال ننظر بارتياب في هدية تهدى لنا‬
In technical terms, this personal pronoun is generic, i.e. “our”
means “anyone’s”; in other words, it is not referential, i.e. referring not
to the speaker (with the royal plural) or to their specific people. Being
generic, the pronoun may refer to all humankind. However, the
referential function may not be excluded. By establishing the
referential function in the opening line, the Fool is talking about a
specific country (Albion=‫ )هذي البَلد‬and its people. This is consistently
confirmed by several similar pronouns as well as place deictics, namely
‘here’ (‫)هنا‬. These specific deictics are not given explicitly in the source
text, but supplied by the reference to Albion in line 91. Accepted as
interpretation, it also allows the lines to refer generically to any
country, and to any people, and to give a connotative independence
lacking in the earlier passage. This is made possible by the fact that the
features and agents of future “great confusion” do not appear in the
play’s action explicitly at this point. That these signs may or will
appear in the future allows the reader to get both generic and referential
signification at the same time. It is an interpretation which suggests
adaptation.

The verse form adopted in the translation may also be regarded

as an attempt by the translator to appropriate the lines. The regular
meter (different from those of the previous passages) and the
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alternation of the close rhyme words ending in M (‫ )ميم‬and N (‫)نون‬

combine to present a unified vision not meticulously corresponding to
that in the source text. In other words, you can read the fourteen-line
prophecy as complete in itself and perhaps applicable to any other
situation, in any given country. This is not what one finds in the earlier
excerpts. It is an instance of how translation can be an adaptation and,
up to a point, an appropriation.

Limits of Adaptation and Appropriation

If we accept the view that every literary translation is a form of
adaptation in the sense of fitting one cultural verbal medium into
another, it will be easier to accept and account for the many translations
which read differently of a given text across many languages or into the
same language across different eras with different cultures. However
hard a translator works to adhere to the language molds of the source
text, the way they reproduce these putatively specific molds into the
target text, he or she will, almost unwittingly, use their own ‘natural’,
acquired or favored verbal mode. As the latter decisively pertain to the
translator’s culture, the process of translation may be thought of as
“transcoding.” However, if a poet-translator adapts a source text in the
way they handle their verse, their muse may interfere and make the
target text half-belonging to them. If the muse’s interference exceeds a
certain limit, it will turn the translator into a co-author, claiming part of
the adaptation process as the translator’s own—hence a degree of
appropriation.

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 Dr_ Shaymaa Adham Basheer (BIJHS) Vol.3 Issue 1 (2021)

If the adaptation is limited to minor additions and/or omissions it

is normally passable and acceptable as more or less inevitable.
However, if the muse’s work introduces changes which transform the
character of the source text, then the adaptation will bespeak
appropriation. An example of the translation of Shakespeare lyric
“Take, O take those lips away” (Measure for Measure, IV.i. 1-8) by al-
Mazini and Enani (cf. The Art of Translation in Arabic) will show the
former adding a whole hemistich in the first line, a conditional
uncalled-for in the third line, and an adjectival phrase in the same third
line in the Arabic translation (where a line is a distich, consisting of
two hemistichs). The addition of the last phrase may be required
culturally, as a kiss in Arabic is thought, without undue prudishness, to
be on the cheek. The omission of the key word “forsworn”, given an
end focus in the English, mars the meaning by not showing the reason
why the poet wants to get away from both (lying) lips and beguiling
eyes. This translation turns the adaptation into an appropriation.

The question of translation being adaptation is handled by Linda

Hutcheon in her A Theory of Adaptation, 2013 (1st edn. 2006). She
says:

As openly acknowledged and extended re-workings of particular

other texts, adaptations are often compared to translations. Just as there
is no such thing as a literal translation, there can be no literal
adaptation. Nevertheless, the study of both has suffered from
domination by “normative and source-oriented approaches” (Hermans,
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1985:9)…[I]t is important to remember that, in most concepts of

translation, the source text is granted an axiomatic primacy and
authority, and that most rhetoric of comparison has most often been
that of faithfulness and equivalence. Walter Benjamin did alter this
frame of reference when he argued, in “Task of the Translator” [in
Schultz and Biguenet, eds., Theories of Translation, 1992] that
translation is not a rendering of some fixed non-contextual meaning to
be copied or paraphrased or reproduced; rather it is an engagement with
the original text that makes us see that text in different ways (p. 77).
Recent translation theories argue that translation involves a transaction
between texts and between languages and is thus “an act of both inter-
cultural and intertemporal communication” (Bassnett, 2002, 9)
[Translation Studies, 3rd edn.] (Hutcheon, p. 16)

Examined in the light of this newer sense of translation, Enani’s

rendering may be seen as a “transcoding” of the source text: his
additions are part of his cultural adaptation. To “wine” he adds
“alcoholic drinks” (‫ ;)ال ُمدام‬to “nobles” he adds “out of vainglory” ( ‫من‬
‫ ;)الزهو‬he interprets “wenches’ suitors” as (‫ ;)العاشقون بجرم الغرام‬he adds
to “cutpurse” a qualification of “wickedness” (‫ ;)زنيم‬to the “usurer’s
gold” is added “unlawful profit” (‫ ;)ربح حرام‬Christianity is rendered as
the “religion of peace” (‫ ;)دين السَلم‬and finally, “great confusion” is
given as (‫)دمار وفوضى بغير زمام‬, that is, unbridled destruction and chaos.
In the language of the new media, Hutcheon explains, this is
“reformatting” (p. 16). She cites Robert Stam’s conclusion that every
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adaptation involves “gain and loss” (Stam, “The Dialogics of

Adaptation”, 2000). In terms of building up an autonomous Arabic
poem in a regular meter, bolstered with rhyme, Enani’s adaptation may
involve more gain than loss: the change of deictics agrees with
normative Arabic idiom, but hardly anything significant is added.

Another important contribution by Hutcheon to the theory of

adaptation is her recognition of paraphrase as a means of adaptation,
common and acceptable. If Enani’s version can be shown to be
appropriation, all prose renderings of the above-quoted lines can be
considered a species of paraphrase without any claim to appropriation.
Such paraphrases do not always prove faithful to the source text: some
may try to improve the phraseology of the original, as Mutran does,
rendering Shakespearean verse: he uses pompous Arabic idiom,
sometimes obsolete, to raise the ‘quality’ of his prose; others cannot
always get the meaning right, ignoring what Shakespeare’s editors and
commentators say. One such case is Badawi’s rendering of the above-
cited prophecy of the Fool in King Lear. A comparison with Enani’s
version shows that the prose unnecessarily changes the sense and in
trying to cut corners, condenses sentences or collapses two into one,
with unfortunate results from the hand of an Oxford don. Here is his
version:

،‫ وحينما يفسد صانع الخمور خمرهم بخلطها بالماء‬،‫حينما تكون ألفاظ الوعاظ أشد داللة‬
‫ وحينما ال يحرق الزنديق ويحرق من‬،‫وحينما يصبح النبَلء هم معلمي خياطيهم حرفتهم‬
‫ حينما تكون كل قضية في المحكمة عادلة فيستوي المذنب والبرئ ـ‬،‫يجري وراء النساء‬
‫ ويكون‬،‫ وال فارس فقير‬،‫حينئذ تعم الفوضى في مملكة ألبيون بعدها لم يوجد سيد بَل ديون‬
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،‫ ويعد المرابون مالهم علنًا‬،‫ وال يندس النشالون وسط الجماهير‬،‫مقر النميمة غير األلسنة‬
‫ ومن يعش حتى ذلك الزمان يرى أن المشي ال يكون إال‬.‫وتبني العواهر والداعرات الكنائس‬
)129 ‫ ص‬2009 ‫على األقدام (بدوي‬

Although notorious for its ambiguities, as thus befitting the Fool’s

own wry logic, the drift of the prophecy is that a “great confusion”
(glossed as chaos and ruin) will occur to England if certain conditions
appear. These are mostly cases of the reversal of the natural order of
things. Priests sacrifice sense for sonorous verbiage; wine makers
“mar” wine; nobles teach their tailors their trade; lovers (suitors of
maids in marriage) are burned instead of heretics; law courts cannot
distinguish the guilty from the innocent. Up until Line 5, the reversal is
maintained but is interrupted by the liberation of members of the
aristocracy from debts which by our standards is a positive
development, soon to be followed by equally good signs, namely: the
slanderers refraining from using their tongues; cutpurses refraining
from practicing their trade; usurers being explicit about their
unlawfully acquired wealth; and finally the anomaly of pimps and
harlots building churches.

So far, the first five lines establish an image, basically negative, of

the future, while the next five lines are ambiguous and can be
differently interpreted. One or two critics have called this a
contradiction; others argue that no consistent point of view should be
reached from the Fool’s words as, after all, he is building up a case of
“great confusion.” By definition, ‘confusion’ can include positive and
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negative elements. This is beautifully exhibited in the last paradoxical

couplet: in line 93 the Fool wonders if he will survive to watch the
“great confusion” and in line 94 he says that people will then walk on
their feet! The sense of confusion is explicitated by the hemistich added
to the Arabic verse rendering, namely “how strange that time will be!”
(‫)فما أغرب اليوم هذا الزمان‬

In both verse and prose renderings, an adaptation is made, but the

earlier adaptation in verse (1996) gives the adaptation an air of
appropriation, while in the second, in prose (2009) the adaptation is
closer to a paraphrase trying to produce a consistent argument by
merging the unmerged two sides of the Fool’s prophecy, still
apparently deferring to the source text.

Arabic Songs in The Merchant of Venice

Written as a romantic comedy, with two intertwined plots, one of
which is based on the meaning of love, friendship and fortitude, the
other on the value of mercy, The Merchant of Venice is full of songs
capable of belonging to both views offered in the opening of this essay
of the function of a Shakespearean song. Marked in the text as ‘songs’,
occurring in the casket scene, they are rendered in verse by two major
translators (Mutran and Enani) and as prose by another eminent writer,
al-Wakeel. Besides the ‘formal’ songs, some passages are written in

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kinds of verse which brings them closer to the lilt of songs, tempting
the translator to render them either into verse or in rhythmical prose.
The first casket scene contains the introduction of the three caskets by
the Prince of Morocco:

Morocco: The first is of gold, who this inscription bears:

“Who chooses me shall gain what many men desire.”
The second, silver, which this promise carries:
“Who chooses me shall get as much as he deserves.”
The third, dull lead, with warning all as blunt:
“Who chooses me must give and hazard all he hath.”
(II.vii. 4-9)
The first version by al-Wakeel, in prose, may be regarded as a
paraphrase, clear and close enough to the source verse:

‫األولى من ذهب وهي تحمل هذه العبارة "سينال من يختارني ما يرغب فيه الكثير من‬
‫ "سيظفر من يختارني بما هو‬:‫ وقد نقش عليها هذا الوعد‬،‫ والثانية من الفضة‬،"‫الناس‬
:‫ وأما الثالثة وهي الرصاص المعتم فعليها تحذير ال يقل عن لونها قتا ًما‬،"‫جدير به‬
".‫"يجب على من يختارني أن يعطي وأن يقامر بكل ما يملك‬
)59‫(ص‬
A recognized poet, Mutran realizes that the inscriptions should be
distinguished by being in verse, and possibly in rhyme, which he
actually does in his rendering of the six lines:

:‫األمير‬
‫األول من ذهب ومكتوب عليه‬
‫تمنت الناس وصلي‬ ‫من اصطفاني فقد ًما‬
‫الثاني من فضة ومكتوب عليه‬
‫أهل له وهو أهلي‬ ‫من انتقاني فأنا‬
‫الثالث من رصاص ومكتوب عليه‬
)63-62 ‫(ص‬ ‫بما يهين ألجلي‬ ‫من ابتغاني فأعزز‬

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The three distichs are written in the same meter, viz. Al-Mugtath,
and share a single rhyme scheme. The language is deliberately, like the
translator’s own rhetoric, slightly antiquated. It is here that we begin to
hear Mutran’s own voice, one that adds a certain tone to the passage,
enabling the listener or the reader to feel the difference between prose
and poetry. In the adaptation, a touch of appropriation is discerned.

In contrast, Enani’s version is all in verse, and the lines on the caskets
are unrhymed. The meter is the modern Khabab, which is close enough
to both the iambic and trochaic beats. It is also close to the source
divisions, like Mutran’s, reflecting the structure of the six lines. Here it
is:
ً ‫األمير ـ األول من ذهب يحمل نق‬
:‫شا مكتوبًا‬
"‫"من يخترني يحظ بما تبغيه الكثرة‬
‫ وعليه الوعد التالي‬.. ‫والثاني من فضة‬
"‫"من يخترني يحظ بما هو أهل له‬
‫ وعليه التحذير‬.. ‫أما الثالث فرصاص مصمت‬
:‫القاطع‬
"‫"إن تخترني أعط وخاطر باألموال جميعًا‬
‫ـ‬ 138 ‫(ص‬
)139

The adaptation to Arabic verse uses Modern Standard Arabic,

which is the common language of writing and the ‘respectable’ media
and is therefore shared by the translation and its contemporary
audience. No attempt at appropriation is felt in the Arabic lines:
nothing significant is added, even the qualification of lead as ‘solid’

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(‫ )مصمت‬instead of ‘dull’ (‫ – )بليد‬an adjective omitted by Mutran –

changes little in the source text. While Mutran omits the adjective
‘blunt’ and al-Wakeel translates the adjective as (‫)قاتم‬, Enani gives the
apparently intended meaning which is (‫( )قاطع‬straightforward or
categorical).

The next song, or lyric, found in the casket by the Prince of

Morocco, is deliberately well-wrought. It is written in tetrameters, with
the occasional modulations (‫ )الزحافات والعلل‬such as the omission of a
final or penultimate unaccented syllable. Rarely in Shakespeare do we
have a single rhyme for 9 consecutive lines. Mutran’s solution to the
rhyme problem is to build his Arabic song into four distichs having a
common rhyme, which is the rule in classical poetry; Enani’s solution
is to have a single rhyme for the first five lines, then four monostichs
with alternating rhyme words. But first let us have the English song:
Morocco: (Reads)
All that glisters is not gold,
Often have you heard that told.
Many a man his life hath sold
But my outside to behold.
Gilded tombs do worms enfold.
Had you been as wise as bold,
Young in limbs, in judgment old,
Your answer had not been inscrolled.
Fare you well. Your suit is cold.
(The Merchant of Venice, II.vii. 56-73)
The apothegmatic quality of the opening line suggests that the
intended audience is every reader or member of the audience as well as
the Prince of Morocco. This is a device common in Arabic as it is in
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English. Sometimes it occurs in a soliloquy, but more often in separate

lines meant to be proverbial. In Ahmad Shawqi’s The Death of
Cleopatra (‫)مصرع كليوباترا‬, the heroine says in her valedictory speech:

‫وقد يشفي العضال من العضال‬ ‫وبعض السم ترياق لبعض‬

One poison’s antidote may be another poison;

The cure of a terminal condition
May be a fatal infection.
The same device may be used as impressive opening lines, regarded
as a clever opening: an example of such a clever opening ( ‫براعة‬
‫ )االستهَلل‬is Abou Tammam’s

...‫السيف أصدق أنبا ًء من الكتب‬

The sword carries more truthful tidings

Than any letters arriving…
A clever opening of an elegy lamenting the death of a crucified
potentate says:

‫لحق أنت إحدى المعجزات‬ ‫علو في الحياة وفي الممات‬

ٌّ

So high in life, in death so high,

A miracle you exemplify.
A wise saying, or a saw, is characterized by brevity, the memorable
nature of verse, the simple diction, and the possibility of various
interpretations. So Abou Tammam’s hemistich, quoted above, is not
only pithy but allows the rhyme word to mean more than ‘letters’; it
may, and indeed does, refer to books in its usual sense. The second
hemistich of the Arabic line confirms both senses, ( ‫في حده الحد بين الجد‬

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‫)واللعب‬. Apart from the word play and antithesis, it can refer to books as
containing information which is unconfirmable. In English one might
say:

Decisively the sword’s edge makes the way

Serious work is separated from play.
In each case, an apothegm is characterized by a strong rhythm,
often metrical, and can stand by itself or link with an adjacent line. In
other words, the proverbial structure tends to be more paratactic than
hypotactic. When the Prince of Morocco reads these lines, he gives us a
line worthy to stand out as a response to his failure: he bids Portia
farewell, realizing that he is now condemned to celibacy, but in words
that may apply to other, similar situations:

Then farewell heat, and welcome frost. (75)

The prose rendering does not do this justice. Mutran renders it as:

)66‫عا أيها الغرام المحرق! سَلم عليك أيها القلب الذي ال يكترث! (ص‬
ً ‫ودا‬
Al-Wakeel gives:

!‫ ومرحبًا بحياة البرودة والحرمان‬،‫عا يا آمال الحب الحارة‬

ً ‫إذن فودا‬
The latter is satisfactory as a paraphrase, but the apothegmatic quality
is to be found in Enani’s

!‫عا يا ربيع ومرحبًا بك يا صقيع‬

ً ‫فودا‬
Let us focus therefore on the poetic quality of the lines as translated in
the two verse versions. Here is first Mutran’s:

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‫ما كل براق من الذهب‬ ‫قل كائ ًنا من كنتَ عن ثقـة‬

‫بدع إذا ثبتت على‬ ‫عظة هي الكنز النفيس فَل‬
‫الحقب‬
‫في حين شعرك غير‬ ‫لو كان رأيك غير مخـتلط‬
‫مختضب‬
‫وبمثل هذا الرد لم تجب‬ ‫ما عدت هذا العود في ندم‬
)66 ‫ ـ‬65‫(ص‬
Enani:

‫ما كل براق ذهب مث ٌل يدور على الحقب‬

‫كم باع شخص روحه كيما يشاهدني وحسب‬
‫بل إن دود القبر يحيــــــــا في توابيــت الـذهـب‬
‫لو كان ذهنك ثاقبًا كشجاعتك‬
‫وحويت في جسم الشباب حصافة‬
‫الشيخ الهرم‬
‫ما جاء هذا الرد على رسالتك‬
‫اذهب وداعًا قد خسرت بخطبتك‬
)140 ‫ ـ‬139 ‫(ص‬
The single pithy line is turned into two distichs by Mutran (4
hemistichs, two of which are unnecessarily added). There is no
dramatic or other need to omit the reference to people sacrificing
themselves so as to “behold” gold, or the fact that gilded coffins
contain maggots. The idea of sacrificing life for gold only to have it in
death, a typical Shakespearean antithesis, is also lost. Mutran’s
metonymies – “if your mind is not confused” (‫ )رأيك غير مختلط‬for “wise”
and “while your hair is not henna-dyed” (‫ )في حين شعرك غير مختضب‬for
“young” are all the translator’s. They testify to the tendency to
appropriate the lines, especially as Mutran in the adaptation process

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allows himself to suppose that the anonymous lines can express the
Prince’s regret (‫)ندم‬.

The initial rhyme words in Enani, (‫ )ذهب‬and (‫ )حقب‬may reveal an

unconscious memory of Mutran’s lines, or a conscious one; it is
unlikely that two translators should have hit upon the same rhyme
words by chance. The former may be naturally used by all translators,
as gold is the theme of the song, but al-hiqab suggests Mutran’s
influence. However, while both translators share the same metre in
Arabic, the shorter variety of this meter, as used by Enani, does
indicate that his version, or part of it, would be proverbial. The first
five lines in the English song are rendered into three distichs containing
6 hemistichs. The last four lines in the source text consist of a single 3-
line hypotactic sentence, plus a single-line conclusion. Enani reflects
this structure by using short paratactic sentences in the first part, then
creates a kind of barrier marking the deictic shift: now the poem will be
addressing the Prince of Morocco. However, while all the feet (‫)تفعيَلت‬
belong to the same meter, with each hemistich in the first part of the
song consisting of two feet, the monostich barrier consists of three feet,
clearing the ground for the regular 3-foot-hemistich norm. The new
rhyme word for the rest of the song is (tec) (‫رسالتك→شجاعتك( )تك‬
→‫ )بخطبتك‬which ensures that the poem now is addressed to the Prince.
So while – like Mutran – Enani aspires to produce apothegmatic
sayings, as he does in the first three distichs of his Arabic text, he goes
back to the dramatic situation by addressing the prince.

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Can it be said that these two translators shared the impulse of

rewriting the song, with one of them more thoroughly changing it so
that it now looks more appropriative? If considered independent poems
based on a Shakespearean song, can they be regarded as attempts to
interpret a source text in ways that make the source less of an
authoritative text, and more of an inspiration of each – in different
ways? In other words, where does one draw the line between objective
and subjective adaptation? However, if a line has to be drawn at all, it
should be between an adaptation and what is thought of (or was once
thought of) as an ‘original’. The late 20th century literary theory has
claimed, in structuralist and post-structuralist studies, that the concept
of originality in writing should be reconsidered, if not denied. This
claim may have had its origins in Claude Levi-Strauss’ thesis,
emerging from his studies in anthropology, which claims that the
structures of thought, in whatever form, are repeated across cultures
(Myth and Meaning, 1978 [2001]). In his “On Originality”, Edward
Said says that “the writer thinks less of writing originally and more of
re-writing” (The World, The Text and the Critic, 1983, p. 185). More
relevant is Jacques Derrida’s idea that in writing, as in translation, the
desire for expression is “the desire to launch things that come back to
you as much as possible” (The Ear of the Other: Otobiography,
Transference, Translation, 1985, p. 157). Derrida’s odd spelling of
‘autobiography’ is meant to merge ‘other’ with ‘auto’, so that when one

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thinks that one is writing about others, one is actually writing about
oneself, and vice versa.

This idea is made more explicit in Roland Barthes’ contention that

in literature “any text is an intertext” (“Theory of the Text” in Untying
the Text: A Post-Structuralist Reader, ed. R. Young, 1981, p. 39).
Barthes means that the works of previous and surrounding cultures are
always present in literature, so that works are not solely dependent on
their authors for the production of meaning: they may have benefited
from their readers who create their own intertextual networks. Readers
with a knowledge of heritage Arabic will find in Mutran’s
Shakespearean translations different meanings from those found by
readers brought up on Modern Standard Arabic. Mutran’s text will be
part of an intertextual network, extending as far back as the Arabic of
pre-Islamic Arabia. So, according to Barthes, readers of Mutran in the
1920s contributed to his style both in writing and translating poetry, as
much as readers of Enani, brought up on MSA, have contributed to his
writing and translation of poetry in the 1980s. The literary
environment, including living traditions, interferes in the building of an
individual poet or translator, so that the result is produced by more than
the talent of the individual: it is here that we see Arnold’s power of the
man and power of the moment coinciding.

If the line separating an ‘original’ work from the various factors

influencing or contributing to it is at best fuzzy, so should the line
separating a translated literary text from such factors. Therefore, if the

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‘original’ and translated literary texts are produced within the same
culture, and about the same time, such factors (as defined by the so-
called French Theory) may be identical, and the old question of
‘accuracy’ or ‘equivalence’ will rear its head. It is when the source and
target texts are produced within different cultures and at different
periods that the consideration of these factors will be of paramount
importance. Insofar as these factors are decidedly different, any
assessment of the translation will have to take them into account: if too
powerful, and thus irresistible, they may influence a translator’s style
more than the source text. One of these factors, of course, is the need to
shape the reader’s response, and, in this case, the translator will give
priority to the text’s perlocutionary force over both “locution” and
“illocution” as defined by Austin (Things To Do With Words, 1962).

This may be the case with Mutran’s rendering of the song sung by
silver, in The Merchant of Venice:

The fire seven times tried this,

Seven times tried that judgment is,
That did never choose amiss.
Some there be that shadows kiss.
Such have but a shadow’s bliss.
There be fools alive, iwis,
Silvered o'er—and so was this.
Take what wife you will to bed,
I will ever be your head.
So be gone. You are sped.
(II. ix. 62-71)

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Insofar as any paraphrase is acceptable in translating poetry, al-

Wakeel’s Arabic version is passable. It gives the ‘skeletal’ idea which
personified silver presents, namely that because silver is refined by
seven processes of melting in fire, it has no impurities, and its
judgment is always right. Certainly (iwis) some people are deceived by
things ‘silvered over’ and so ‘kiss’ the appearance and not the
substance, such as you, Prince of Aragon. They are fools, as much as
you are: so put the dunce’s cap on your head and go. Shakespeare
makes the mistake of letting silver ask the Prince to marry whomever
he wants, because this breaks the oath (or the vow) to be condemned to
celibacy by the loser. Here is the prose rendering by al-Wakeel:

،‫ ولقد محص هذا سبع مرات‬،‫ (يقرأ) لقد تطهر هذا في النار سبع مرات‬:‫أمير أرغونة‬
،‫نفرا يقبلون األشباح‬
ً ‫ بيد أن من الناس‬.‫ولم يحدث من قبل أن طاش سهم اختياري‬
،‫ وال مراء أن بين األحياء بلهاء‬،‫وأولئك ال يظفرون من السعادة إال بخيالها العابر‬
،‫ فلتتزوج ممن شئت‬،‫ وتلك حال تلك العلبة‬،‫يبدون في مظهر أسمى من حقيقتهم‬
)69‫ (ص‬.‫فسأظل أنا على المدى رأسك! إذن فانصرف فلقد أنجزت مهمتك‬

However, as paraphrase, it cannot be aesthetically equal, or

merely comparable to the verse and its techniques. The translator tries
to ‘elevate’ the prose style by using a common idiom in Arabic about
an arrow shot but gone astray, but changes the significance of “silvered
o’er” as the condition of the casket: Shakespeare repeats ‘this’ of the
first line to make it refer to the speaker, silver, not as in the paraphrase,
the ‘condition of the casket’. The first person pronoun in the
penultimate line refers to the dunce’s cap or the fool’s head, but the

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prose rendering repeats ‘this’, which throughout refers to silver. In

attempting to adhere too closely to the words of the song, the translator
misses one or two meanings.

Even as an adaptation, every paraphrase is inevitably checked for

accuracy against the source text it tries to replicate. “This” appears as
(‫ )هذا‬twice in the first line, then as ‘the case of that casket’ ( ‫وتلك حال تلك‬
‫ )العلبة‬and finally as ‘I’ (‫)أنا‬. Instead of explicating, the paraphrase
confuses the sense by not linking the words to the dramatic situation,
the paraphrase may be an adaptation, but, lacking in accuracy and
aesthetic quality, makes an inept representative of the source text.

On the other hand, Mutran’s five distichs declare from the

beginning that it is an Arabic poem in imitation of Shakespeare’s lines.
He uses his own language, immersed in heritage Arabic, which does
not invite the reader to go back to the source text. His opening formula
is the spurious conditional, previously mentioned. His man (‫ )من‬is
technically a substitute for ‘if’, meaning ‘while’ or ‘whereas’. One is
reminded of Shawqi’s

‫لبست بها فأبليت الثيابا‬ ‫ومن يغتر بالدنيا فإني‬

If there are men who wrongly trust this world,

I am not one of them,
For I tried on all her garbs and wore them out.
‫يمت كقتيل الغيد بالبسمات‬ ‫ومن تضحك الدنيا له فيغترر‬

If a man is deceived by a smiling world,

He’ll end up dead
Like the victims of maidens’ smiles.
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Mutran establishes his appropriation primarily by adopting a

classical module: his idea may be the opposite of what Shakespeare
says, but then he shows less interest in the idea than in producing an
Arabic poem worthy to be enjoyed. Let us see how he translates the
lines:

‫بالنار قد محصت سـبع مرار‬ ‫من راضـه ألـم الخطوب فإنـنـي‬

ً
‫خطَل يبادره وســــــوء خيار‬ ‫من عاش لم يأمن على طول المدى‬
‫فينال ظل ســـــــعادة وفـخار‬ ‫في النـاس مخـدوع يـقـبّل ظلـــه‬
‫فـــي مظــهر متألــق غــرار‬ ‫ي العقـل مثلي بيـنـهم‬
ّ ‫وفتــى خـل‬
‫فاحمل حمولك وانج من ذي الـدار‬ ‫أنـى تكن ما أنـت إال مشــــبهـي‬
)72-71 ‫(ص‬
Paraphrased, the lines say that while some people are broken by
the pain of disasters, I have been seven times purified by fire. All living
men are not safe from error and bad choice. Someone may be deluded
and so kisses his shadow, gaining a shadow of happiness and pride.
You’ll meet an empty-headed man somewhere, with a glittering,
tempting appearance. Whatever you are, you’re just like me; so pack up
and save yourself from this house.

If the difference between adaptation and appropriation can lie in

the degree of explicitness of expressing their purpose, as Julie Sanders
argues (2006, p.8) then Mutran most explicitly shows his appropriation
intention. To begin with, he adapts the idea of being tried by fire as
‘trials and tribulations’ – the ‘pain of disasters’. The second distich
accepts ‘bad choice’ as a possibility to which everybody is prone,
including silver and the Prince. The opening (‫ )من‬is inclusive. The third

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distich is close enough to the Shakespearean image, with the doubling

(‫ )سعادة وفخار‬having an end focus. Omitting the reference to a wife,
Mutran uses one of his common formulas (‫ )كائنا ما كنت(→)أنى تكن‬etc. to
indicate the Prince’s similarity to silver! Finally we have the uncalled-
for advice to the Prince to “save himself from this house!” The addition
and omission will therefore be acceptable as part of the appropriation
process but will hardly establish the Shakespearean text to the Arabic
reader. Now let us examine how this is translated. To begin with, the
translator, as dramatist, establishes the situation on the stage, adding or
expanding the stage directions already in the text. All editions give the
following stage direction:

([The Prince] unlocks the silver casket.) Arragon then says:

What’s here? The portrait of a blinking idiot

Presenting me a schedule! I will read it. (53-4)
!‫ماذا أجد هنا؟ صورة معتوه غماز في يده ورقة! فألقرأها‬

At Line 61, he repeats “What is here”, and Enani adds his own stage
directions as part of the adaptation process; these say,

)‫ (يقرا المكتوب في الورقة على لسان حال الفضة ثم على لسان األبله الغماز‬:‫أراجون‬
‫صهرتني األيدي مرات سب ًعا في النار‬
‫فتطهر حكمي حتى ما أخطأ يو ًما في أمر خيار‬
‫لن يسعد من لثم األوهام‬
‫إال بنعيم األحَلم‬
‫كم من حمقى لون الفضة يكسوهم‬
‫وأنا منهم‬
‫فاصحب من شئت إلى مخدع عرسك‬
‫لن تخلع رأس األحمق من رأسك‬
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‫آن أوان رحيلك‬

‫فامض لحال سبيلك‬
)‫(يطوي الورقة‬
The adaptation is limited to the addition of stage directions which
link the song closely to its context. After all, we are watching a scene,
which means we have immediacy of action (‫)حضورية الحدث‬: we hear the
words as we watch the action. The change from the silver speaking to
the speech of the “blinking idiot” at the 6th line is marked by the short
monostich requiring a pause in the delivery. The “I” in the penultimate
line Enani changes to (‫)رأس األحمق‬. This seems logical as that which
will be “ever your head” refers not to silver but to the head of the
“blinking idiot”. Adhering to the dramatic situation categorically tips
the translation into dramatic adaptation.

Mutran’s tendency to appropriation reaches a climax when a

professional singer, complete with a chorus repeating the refrain after
him, is presented in III.ii. 63-72. Let us first have the song:

Singer: Tell me where is fancy bred,

Or in the heart, or in the head?
How begot, how nourished?
All: Reply, reply.
Singer: It is engender'd in the eyes,
With gazing fed; and fancy dies
In the cradle where it lies.
Let us all ring fancy's knell
I'll begin it. Ding, dong, bell.
All: Ding, dong, bell. (III.ii. 63-72)
The key to Mutran’s appropriation intention is his choice of
Arabic metre for the song. The point of the song is simple, common
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and easy to grasp: attraction to a lady’s beauty gives the viewer an

illusion that he is in love. However, this is only “a fancy”, an imagined
love, and the proof is given in the second stanza, namely that it dies in
its cradle. The singer then marks the death of an illusion, implicitly
calling for real love, heartfelt emotion, in its place. Here is Enani’s
version:

‫في العين أم في القلب؟‬ ‫ما أصل وهم الحب‬ :‫المغني‬

!‫وكيف يرتوي أجب‬ ‫قل كيف يولد قل‬
‫ أجب‬...‫أجب‬ :‫الجوقة‬
‫فــبنـظـرة يـــروى‬ ‫العيـــــــــن مولــده‬ :‫المغني‬
‫ويموت فـي مــهده‬ ‫لكنـــــــه يـــــــذوي‬
‫وســأبتـدي األتـراح‬ ‫انعوه يا صــحــــبي‬
‫حـزنًا على مـا راح‬ ‫وشــاركوني الدمـع‬
!‫لهفي على مـا راح‬ :‫الجوقة‬
Al-Wakeel’s prose rendering (p. 81) need not bother us, for it
remains a paraphrase echoing the source text so closely that it can
hardly be described as adaptation. Mutran’s version is, however, an
adaptation suggesting appropriation. A predominant factor determines
this, namely an Arabic metre called Al-Monsarih, (‫ )المنسرح‬a rare metre
used by the great poets, old and new, and showing true competence at
versifying. Modern poets who use it reveal an aspiration to rival the
ancients. Among the great poets of the past we have al-Mutanabbi.
Take the opening of his elegy on the death of Taghlib Ibn Dawood,
thus:

‫أكرم من تغلب بن داوود‬ ‫ما ســــدكت علة بـمـورود‬

‫حل به أصدق المواعـــيد‬ ‫يأنف من ميتة الفراش وقد‬
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‫غير سروج السوابح القود‬ ‫ومثله أنــكر المـمـات على‬

Never a sickness a sick man gripped

More gracious than Taghlib Ibn Dawood;
Too proud to accept death in bed
Now the truest promise has been fulfilled.
Like him was he whom death disavowed
Not mounted on the saddle of a steed.
)292‫ ص‬،2000 ،‫ مرشد المترجم‬،‫(عناني‬
Among contemporary poets who accepted the challenge of this
metre was Abu Hammaam (the pen-name of the late Abdul-Latif
Abdul-Haleem), who produced a whole volume of verse entitled “In
the Shrine of Al-Monsarih” (‫)في مقام المنسرح‬. Now Mutran surprises the
reader by departing almost totally from the source text, to give us 3
couplets, instead of the original ten lines, with each in a different
Arabic metre: al-Monsarih, al-Mugtath, and al-Mutaqarib.1 The result
is a number of Arabic lines which neither read as a poem nor owe
much to the Shakespearean song. ‘There is a method’ in his imitation:
In each couplet, the first line draws on the Shakespearean source, the
second is Mutran’s own; and has three voices in his song, each using its
own metre, the first two are single singers, the third is the chorus. So
this is Mutran’s song:

‫في العقل أم في الفؤاد مولده‬ ‫أين مكان الهوى ومنبتـه‬ ‫صوت ينشد‬
‫دال من المـــالكيــن أيــده‬ ‫ومن مبــاه به الجَلل فقد‬
‫للحــــب هـــن مــــــــهود‬ ‫تلك العيـون الســواهي‬ ‫آخر ينشد‬
‫قضـــى وهـن اللـــحـود‬ ‫نارا‬
ً ‫إن يســـــقه اللحظ‬

1
I have received help in the analysis of Arabic prosody from Dr. Morsi Awwaad, of Port-Said
University (private communication).
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‫ويســــمــع نواح األســف‬ ‫ليهـتف هتاف األســـى‬ ‫الجميع ينشد‬

‫ويودي ســــريع الشــغف‬ ‫يخف صريــع المـنــى‬
)84 ‫(ص‬
However, Mutran has another surprise for us: a couplet of Al-
Monsarih may have indicated his mastery of Arabic prosody, but (he
must have wondered) is it enough? He who has the craft of verse at his
command must regale the reader with a few more of the same. An
opportunity appears in the third and final casket scene, when a scroll
inside it addresses the reader in metre and rhyme. There are only eight
lines; let us read them in English:

You that choose not by the view,

Chance as fair and choose as true!
Since this fortune falls to you,
Be content and seek no new,
If you be well pleased with this
And hold your fortune for your bliss,
Turn you where your lady is
And claim her with a loving kiss.
(III.ii. 131-8)
Enani gives us a translation that departs but little from the source
text, showing that however freely he undertakes linguistic adaptation,
his focus is consistently on the source text. Free from ambitions of
appropriation, his text is as close as possible to the ideal of faithfulness
in translation. Here is what it says:

‫يا من تحاشى أن تخادعه‬

‫المظـاهر‬
‫ورأى بأن العقل يقضي أن‬
‫يخاطر‬
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‫ما دام هذا السعد قد واتاك‬

‫غامر‬
‫فاهنأ به وحذار أن تنشد آخر‬
‫فإذا رضيت بما تحقق من‬
‫هناء‬
‫ورأيت في السعد النعيم بَل‬
‫مراء‬
‫فاذهب إلى من تولهت بها‬
‫وبقبلة أعلن بأنك زوجها‬
One need hardly emphasize how few Enani’s additions are to the
Shakespearean song. The opening line contains a word confirming the
opposite of the rhyme word in the second line: ‘to choose true’ (or
right) is not to be ‘deceived’. The implicit antithesis is thus made
explicit. Two words are apparently added to maintain the rhyme
scheme, namely (‫ )غامر‬and (‫)بَل مراء‬. Their qualification of the
preceding nouns is minimal. In fact, they can be omitted with hardly
any change in the sense of the lines. Such verbal adaptation is nearly
always acceptable in the translation of poetry.

Now look at the four distichs written by Mutran. They are cited in full,
with no comment as the reader can see how the four lines of al-
Monsarih represent Mutran’s appropriation of Shakespeare’s song:

‫ولم يزغ في طَلئه نــظره‬ ً

‫باطَل فمر به‬ ‫يا من رأى‬
‫مغويه والسعد راب ًحا خــطره‬ ‫يهنئك العقل لم يضــــل به‬
‫كما يصيب الجزاء منتــظره‬ ‫لئن تكن قد حظيت بعد جوى‬
‫فالعمر قد طاب والمنى ثمـره‬ ً ‫قبل محيا العروس مغتبـ‬
‫طا‬

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A detailed paraphrase of the English, and a rich commentary, may

be found in a yet unfinished Ph.D. dissertation to be submitted by Israa
Said to Fayoum University. Arabic readers can find for themselves how
Mutran’s version differs from Enani’s and from the source text.

Conclusion
The examination of the Arabic translations of Shakespearean
songs reveals that the early translators, brought up on classical Arabic
models, have tended, more than modern verse translators, to
appropriate Shakespeare’s lines in their adaptations. It has also
revealed that paraphrase, a canonical form of adaptation, would force
the scholar to check it against the source text. Here too, translations in
prose can be disappointing to the accuracy-seeker. Even if the prose
translator is eager to produce an equivalent text, their adaptation will be
lacking in aesthetic quality: as a paraphrase it will never be equal to the
source text. The view of translation as adaptation has opened up new
avenues for assessing translated poetry.

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Works Cited

1. Al-Wakeel, M., translator. The Merchant of Venice, in Arabic, 1992

(?1972)
2. Badawi, M.S., translator. King Lear, in Arabic, 2010.
3. Bassnett, Translation Studies, 2009.
4. Bevington, David, ed. Shakespeare’s Works. 4th Edition, updated,
1997.
5. Bevington, David, ed. The Merchant of Venice. Bantam, 1088.
6. Brown, John Russell, ed. The Merchant of Venice. Arden, 1964
(1972).
7. Drakakis, John, ed. The Merchant of Venice. Arden, 2010 (2018).
8. Enani, M. The Art of Translation, in Arabic, 1993.
9. Enani, M. The Translator’s Guide, in Arabic, 2008.
10. Enani, M. translator. King Lear. In Arabic. GEBO, 1996.
11. Enani, M. translator. The Merchant of Venice. In Arabic. GEBO,
2002.
12. Foakes, R.A., ed. King Lear. Arden, 1997.
13. Halio, Jay L., ed. The Merchant of Venice. Oxford, 1993 (2008).
14. Hutcheon, Linda, with Siobhan O’Flynn. A Theory of Adaptation,
2006. (2nd revised edn. 2016)
15. Kermode, Frank, ed. Shakespeare, King Lear: A Selection of Critical
Essays, 1969.
16. Mahood, M.M., ed. The Merchant of Venice. Cambridge, 1987 (1992)
17. Mutran, Khalil, translator. The Merchant of Venice. In Arabic. 1998
(first edn. 1922)
18. Pooler, T., ed. The Merchant of Venice. Arden, 1916.
19. Sanders, Julie. Adaptation and Appropriation. Routledge, 2006.
20. Shelte & Bassnett, eds., Theories of Translation, 1998.
21. Wilson, John Dover, ed. The Merchant of Venice. Cambridge, 1926.

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